This deleted scene from If I Could Stay was written before I decided to have Leila leave her money and IDs in the trunk of her car. Instead, I simply had her lose them while she was with Jack, but she didn’t realize it until after he’d dropped her off at the bus station. She had to track him down to get it back.
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It took me a while to track down the police station, but once I got reliable directions, which involved a surprising number of tree street names, it wasn’t hard to find. It was on Chestnut street, just past Pamela’s Hair Styling. I walked along the sidewalk and studied the parking lot, but Jack’s truck wasn’t there. He likely wasn’t on shift yet, since he had been driving in the early hours of the morning…
I’m so excited to post this cover reveal! Most of you have heard me talk about my awesome editor, Jana Miller. She also happens to be my sister, and in a few weeks she will be an author! In addition to being an amazing editor, she’s also a fantastic writer and has finished her first YA novel about time manipulation. It’s such a fun read.
I feel like I need to add a caveat here and say IT IS NOT ROMANCE. I don’t want y’all going into it expecting romance (because we all know I’m all about romance), and then being disappointed when it’s not, because then you might decide to give it a bad review and I’d have to go all protective-younger-sister on all y’all. So just know it’s a fantastic, fun, well-written and clean read. But no romance.
Author: Jana Miller Genre: Speculative YA Release Date: July 5th, 2019
Ever since discovering her ability to rewind time seven years ago, Chloe has been reaching—reaching for a worthy use of her ability, reaching for redemption from her past, and reaching for the kind of validation she’ll never find as long as she has to keep this secret.
By the time she’s sixteen, Chloe has decided that rewinding is not a gift at all, but punishment for her part in the tragedy that has shaped her life. And when she discovers that Jake, a careless senior in one of her classes, possesses the same ability, she has no idea what to do about it or whether she can even trust him. But then other rewinders reveal themselves, and Chloe finds that there’s much more to her own story than she’s ever imagined.
Secrets of the past combine with rivalries of the present to set off a series of painful events and impossible discoveries, and soon Jake and Chloe find themselves in a race to piece together a puzzle of ancient relics, family feuds, and strands of time as they seek to defuse the threat not only to their powers but to her family and the fabric of time itself.
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Sounds awesome, right?! It was so fun to read and I hope all of you who enjoy YA will give it a try.
You might have noticed my posts having a bit of a theme lately.
The fighting. The opinions. The I-am-right-and-you-are-wrong of how we interact with one another, especially when we are safely ensconced behind our keyboards, has been constantly on my mind.
I’m so tired of fighting. I’m so tired of witnessing the fighting. It hurts to scroll through social media and see that someone I love has posted something that mocks and degrades an opinion or decision or belief that is part of me. I don’t mind if people disagree with me. Not at all. I want those around me to be awake and form their own opinions and make their own choices based on their experience, what they know, what they value. Of course you won’t make all the same decisions as I do. That’s because we’ve lived different lives, and I am doing my best to respect the lives that people have lived and to try to understand them. Which of course goes back to the idea of letting people tell their story.
But what about when you’re confused by decisions that people make and there’s no opportunity to ask them to clarify? How can we reconcile someone holding an opinion when everything we’ve seen and experienced tells us that it’s the wrong decision? Are they just idiots? Maybe they’re just stubborn and mean and blind and wrong.
Maybe. But even if one or more of those things are true, there are also reasons.
In writing, whenever your character does something, it needs to be done with intent. There needs to be an underlying reason or motivation for their actions. This is one of those things that will drive readers crazy when authors get it wrong, because if an author is just sticking a character in a situation and making them do the thing for reasons of plot without giving them the proper motivation, it feels off. It jars the reader from the story as they wonder what the hey is going on with the character. There’s no reason for that character to make that decision. Everything we know about Sally so far has led us to believe that she wouldn’t just quietly agree to hand over the enchanted book. Sally has been protecting it for more than half the book, and she’s just giving it up without a fight? No, we need motive. So then if we know that Sally has a little brother who will die if she doesn’t do what Mr. Villain says, then we can get on board. She has her reasons, and while we might think that saving one life isn’t worth an entire nation dying, we can at least see that for her, it is worth it.
Unfortunately, we can’t read the inner dialogue of those around us, so we’re left to wonder about their motivation, and often be confounded by what could convince them to make that decision, to support that cause, to be on the anti side of this debate and the pro side of that issue.
May I suggest that the answer to all of those question is REASONS.
She’s anti-gun because she experienced a mass shooting. He’s pro-life because he and his wife can’t have a baby of their own. She chose not to vaccinate because a vaccine paralyzed her nephew.
At the same time:
He’s pro-gun because an intruder nearly killed his mother. She’s pro-choice because there was no way for her baby to survive and if they hadn’t ended the pregnancy, she wouldn’t have survived either. He chose to vaccinate because his family member suffered through that disease.
They all have their reasons, and we can disagree with them all we want, but we can’t pretend that everyone else is wrong and only our experiences and choices are valid.
Now, of course there are outliers. People with ill intent, people who just want to argue, people who just want to hate. But even those people got that way somehow. Did they choose it? Some of them might have. Or were they taught it and just don’t know how to break down what they’ve spent years learning? Unlearning cultural norms and society rules is HARD.
This, by the way, is the way to write good villains. Villains are much more powerful when their motives make sense. If you create a villain who is a terrible person because they like being a terrible person…okay. That’s a nice cardboard cut-out, but readers want all characters to be three-dimensional.
Maybe that’s a good way to think of people as well. In this world where we stare at a screen and see the two-dimensional or even one-dimensional representation of people, we have to keep in mind that what we see isn’t all of them. We are all made up of multiple dimension, countless layers, myriad experiences, failures, pains, and triumphs. We are made up of the bullies that whispered in our ears, the parents that cheered us on, the love that broke our heart, the hard choices foisted upon us. It’s all there in a tangled mess that few people are going to look close enough to see, much less comprehend.
So I hope we can all move forward with grace. That we can all offer mercy, extend a hand of understanding and the gift of forgiveness. And just as important, I hope that we can accept those things from others.
I’m trying something new. It’s a new forum, a new way to get your feedback, and a new way to involve my readers in the process. So if you’re interested in seeing a lot more of the nitty gritty of writing and being an indie author, check out my introductory video over on Patreon. We’re going to have some fun.
Want to help me write a book? Because that’s an option now. 🙂 Want to receive early copies of my books before they even go up for pre-order. That’s an option too.
Give it a look. See what you think. And join me if you’d like to participate!
Keeping Kinley has been selected for publication by Kindle Press!
See? It’s right there at the top of the KindleScout site. Doesn’t it look great there?
I’ve already updated my files, so now I’m waiting on the Kindle Press team to review it and offer any suggestions. If I’m lucky, the process will go quickly, but I really don’t know how long it will take, so please bear with me. As soon as I know anything about pre-order or publication dates, I’ll be shouting it from the rooftops.
Now that Saving Marilee has been out for more than a year, I finally got around to writing a scene from James’ point of view. It’s the scene of their first meeting, and if you’d like to see it, please go sign up for my newsletter. That will give you access to all of my extra content. Those of you who have already signed up should have an email in your inbox with the link.
The blog tour for Painting Rain is happening right now. And along with that comes a GIVEAWAY! Enter using the rafflecopter below for a chance to win $50. Also, I’ve added a link to my Pinterest in case your interesting in seeing the pins I’ve found and used as inspiration for my books. Continue reading →
I’m not one to work on multiple projects at once. I’d rather not split my focus, but for this very special project I made an exception. I’ve been working on this for about four and a half months now, and I’ll be working on it for another four and a half.
Whether this project will center around a hero or a heroine, I don’t yet know, but I’ll let you know when that verdict is in.
She’s compassionate, wonderful and talented. She’s married to an amazing man who’s held her up and cried with her as they’ve battled through the aching and sorrow of infertility. They’ve held hands and cried tears of joy as they discovered their IVF treatment gave them a baby, then sobbed with the kind of grief I’ll never know when that miracle was lost through a miscarriage. Then they did it all over again. Three rounds of IVF. Two joyous pregnancies. Two heart breaking miscarriages. Continue reading →
I’ve got a deleted scene from Saving Marilee for you to read. And as a bonus, everyone who signs up in the next week will be entered into a drawing automatically. Continue reading →
